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“Do you think there is a right way to handle something like this?” Davis asked as she stroked her hair.
“Um, no?”
“It wasn’t a trick question.” Her mother snorted softly. “Listen, in Psychiatry-land we recognize there are five stages of grief — denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Sounds like you were stuck in stage two.”
“Big time.” Andy sighed. “I should probably apologize to a few people.”
“I’ve always been of the opinion that it never hurts to say I’m sorry if you think you’ve hurt someone.” Davis’s arm came around her, squeezing tight for a moment. “But Andalise,youare hurting too, and I am so,sosorry that is the case.”
“Me t-too.” Andy rolled over so they were face to face. “I miss her. I miss Petals.”
“Oh, baby, I know. You grew so attached to her. She was your little friend.” Davis palmed her cheek, eyes shimmery-blue reflections of her own. “But don’t forget you still have a lot of big friends that love you too.”
Hand falling between them, Davis glanced about the room. When she spied the surfboard propped up against Andy’s dresser, she smiled. “Looks like even more than you had a couple months ago.”
Damn, her mom was good. The woman knew how to probe even without asking a bunch of annoying questions. Face warming, Andy fell back to her pillow. “A few,” she said vaguely.
Her mother held her tongue again. Another wise move.
“Alright,” Andy drawled, “I have a boyfriend now, okay? His name is Luke, and he’s super-tall and super-handsome, and he has tattoos all over his body.” Andy added this last part just to test her mother.
Davis, impressively, did not flinch.
“They’re mostly just on his arms,” Andy amended. “I’ve studied them extensively.”
A probing “Oh?” followed this declaration.
Andy huffed out a sigh. “Fine. We’ve had sex.”
“I gathered that.”
“A lot of it.” Andy’s gaze flickered to her mother in time to catch her glance towards the tent still wadded up in the laundry basket.
“I see,” Davis said, brows shooting up to her hairline.
“But mostly at his condo,” Andy tacked on because her mother was starting to look a bit weirded out as her gaze traveled back to the bed.
Letting out a breath, she shot Andy a concerned look. One that usually proceeded with some serious helicopter-mom action. “Youareusing protection, right? Condoms are a must. Have you gotten a prescription for birth control yet? There are so many good options these days. I can take you to the hospital if you want. I know how much you hate going—”
“Luke already went with me.”
The helicopter action sputtered to a stop. “Oh. Okay. That’s… that’s good I guess.”
“You guess?”
Her mother cocked her head. “Well, I can’t decide if that makes this Luke guy sound super sweet or super horny.”
“Oh, he’s both.”
Davis laughed out a groan. “Just be careful, Andalise. I’m not ready to be a grandmother.”
“We’re so not there yet.”
Davis snickered. “When do I get to meet this boyfriend of yours?”
Andy sighed. “Gray said he’d be over this morning, but I’m not sure. After the way I treated him yesterday, I wouldn’t blame Luke if he ran for the hills.”
“Not much of a boyfriend if he’d let something like that scare him off,” her mother grumbled before her ears perked up and her attention swung towards the hallway.
